Month: November 2023

It’s time to move forward. Last week one morning I woke up thinking about Alexei Nevalny, locked in a Russian prison in Siberia because he dared to speak out against the corruption and injustice of the Russian government. He ran for President of Russia. The last guy that did that died of poisoning. Nevalny survived poisoning, but barely lives in a Siberia prison.

I should be thanking God we can speak out in America. I wish we would speak, not in ugliness, carping and criticising, but pointing out the problems and helping to come up with solutions. This morning I woke up reciting a poem about peace. I’ve forgotten the words already, they are lost in the dream, but the feeling is still with me. Lately I’ve been waking feeling the rocks of the streets of Northern Gaza under my feet. I heard yesterday that the streets are so bad with shooting and bombing that the people who are supposed to be evacuating are cowering in their houses. It’s too dangerous and awful to go outside so the people are not evacuating. Gaza is a story of sadness all in itself isn’t it? Let’s see. If I hide a terrorist under my house or under our hospital in the basement, should I expect to be bombed? Well, maybe. Our world is filled with crying children and dying babies. And so I change my view and I look… up. And I look for Advent.

In November, the Catholic Christian prays for the dead. For people who have lost loved ones, November is a special time. We put the names of our loved ones on the altar, and we offer Mass and prayer for the “holy souls.” We pray for the mercy and the loving kindness of Jesus to save the souls of our loved ones as he promises “in the words written in red.” We pray for peace in bereaved hearts. My sister died last month, and my Mother died in November a few years ago, so I pray they are at peace with my sister who died when I was two, and with my grandmothers. Peace. I pray with my friends in church. We pray and we put our hands on our hearts and we believe Jesus is taking care of our loved ones. Jesus is in our hearts. Well! Today I ask if it is OK to skip forward to Advent. I’m tired of death and dying. I’m so done with war and exploding rocks and gunfire. I bow my head and I pray for peace, but quite honestly, I can’t see the solution. In the past, and now again, we put the whole sad situation into the laps of the UN. Well that isn’t working is it? It hasn’t worked in the past and it isn’t working now. Countries are fighting like my sister and I fought 70 years ago about who gets the little rocking chair for our dolls. My mother took a photo of us both holding onto that rocking chair, and the look on our faces is pure “MINE… you get away!!!” If looks could kill, Donna and I would be in Gaza, fighting over belief and land. So I ask, “Lord God, could we fast forward to the end of November; to the feast day of Christ the King; to the celebration of Advent when we look forward with candles to light the way of the Lord? Come Lord Jesus. We need you because we just can’t solve these problems ourselves. Come Lord Jesus.” … “OK. I’ll wait.”

I woke up this morning thinking about Alexei Navalny who is imprisoned in Siberia because he ran against the Russian government on a freedom ticket. While Navalny is imprisoned, and in danger of death, the people of Russia are silent. Do the Russian people believe anyone who runs against the Putin government is a criminal? Do they know what a dark fearful world they live in? Do they know how evil it is to hate the one who speaks what they don’t know, and to hate what they are told is evil? Do they know that their silence kills the good? Are we Americans bound to go the same way: hating what we don’t like or understand? Is our dark, carping, critical rhetoric as damaging as the rhetoric that keeps Navalny in prison?

What if I hate what a person does, or what he says and seems to support? I must fall on my face before God and ask “where are you in this? Is any of this Holy Spirit inspired?” I must be sure that what I hate, God would hate also. Maybe it’s best to pray for God’s will and pray that I’m not taking a human side in this battle we are in.

While repotting plants for the March Garden Club sale, I fall back on my heels and I think of what I have to do this week: find a substitute lector because we are going on a trip for Thanksgiving and on another trip to a cousin’s wedding, confirm a dinner date, make an appointment with a doctor, refill a prescription. This is a normal list of things to do. If you are like me, and you make lists, they might resemble mine. So: what’s on your list?

I’ll bet what’s not on your list is: forage for food and milk for the baby, find water for the family, wash and bandage filthy, infected wounds, find missing and possibly tortured family, find a way out of the hell of your country in a vicious war, avoid falling bombs and swinging machetes. These are tough times. Our government-issued danger list is colored bright orange moving toward red. Terrorism is a word close to people’s tongues. We worry what will happen in our neighborhoods and on our college campuses. I crouch now; my face is bent to the ground under the weight of the dead and mutilated in Israel, Palestine, and Africa … Dead children and men, mutilated mothers, missing family… and I wail once again: “Lord! God! Creator-Father, … Enough!” God answers, and yes, God answers, even though we hardly hear him; “I am here. Look up. See? Wait.” I look up. I shake my head. “Are you sure, God? What about the people stumbling around in bloody rubble? Mothers. Babies. What about the mutilations? This isn’t barbaric times, Lord. This is 2023!” “It isn’t your time,” He answers, “It is my Father’s time. It is the Creator’s time.” I thank God I have been taught about faith. I thank God our priest prays so faithfully for us, every day. Otherwise what would this Creator-Father look like but some mean one-eyed monster. Many believe that he doesn’t see or care. Many don’t believe in our Father-God. They wave bundles of sage to clear the air and chant mystic mumbled words in strange languages. Jesus reminds me, “Pray for the unbelievers. Bring them home. Go out and get them; you do the work. Pray. Wait. Don’t you know that the souls of the just are in the hands of God? Don’t you know that I will raise you up on the last day?” “Yes.” I say. “Yes.”